CARSON, Calif.—Among the most important players on the 2006 German World Cup team that did so much to change the world’s perception of German soccer (and arguably the country’s perception of itself) was a man confined to the bench for nearly the entire tournament.

Oliver Kahn was a legend—a frequent champion with Bayern Munich and the only goalkeeper to win the World Cup’s Golden Ball. But by the spring of ’06, Germany coach Jurgen Klinsmann was convinced his team’s best hope to win the sport’s most coveted title lay with Arsenal’s Jens Lehmann.

“I had to tell (Kahn) two months before the World Cup, ‘You’re going to be the No. 2,’” Klinsmann recalled. “Obviously he was not happy. … I said, ‘Take a couple of days. Think about it.’ We feared that he says, ‘I’m not part of that anymore because I am who I am.’ But he came back and said, ‘You know what? I’m pissed off. I’m mad at you. But I’m in.’

“And I said, ‘Well, if you’re in, this is your role, because you’re not a normal sub. You’re Oliver Kahn. If you understand your role is to become a real driving force from the bench, a real connector between the players, as kind of a solution finder for their problems, a mentor to younger players that are there and (overwhelmed) going into a World Cup.’”

Klinsmann said that Kahn “became that mentor, became that driving force, became that pusher even though he was pissed as hell at me.”

Lehmann backstopped Die Mannschaft to the semifinals, where it lost to eventual champion Italy in overtime. Kahn was rewarded with a start in the bronze medal game. Six years later, Klinsmann still lauds the German giant’s contribution and uses it as a blueprint for the type of team he hopes to build in the U.S.

“There are specific roles that are even more important than, actually, the guy that is on the field,” he said. “There’s only kind of one cake of energy. If you have 100 percent in that cake and you have maybe two players who take 40 percent of that energy, you have a huge problem.”

Speaking to a small group of reporters the day before the MLS Cup final in Los Angeles, Klinsmann spent more than 90 minutes (it figures he’d head into extra time) outlining his philosophy and his take on what the U.S. needs to secure its place among the elite.

At his core, the former World Cup champion prioritizes two qualities above all others—hunger and humility. Last week, Sporting News took a look at Klinsmann’s devotion to doing more. Speed, strength, flexibility, body fat, a player’s command of tactics or language—all of it’s quantitative, all of it’s important and Klinsmann believes that all can be improved through individual commitment.

But genuine team chemistry, like that which Kahn helped create in ’06, is more amorphous and elusive. Klinsmann is consumed with replicating it with the U.S., starting from the moment a new player arrives in camp. If that player thinks his performance on the training field and in the gym is all the manager will be measuring, then he’s missing a significant chunk of what Klinsmann is all about.

“We want to see how he kind of does in training and does within the group and what character he has,” he said. “It is a group that is growing more and more and a group that kind of has a lot of new, fresh blood. In the inner circle, a lot of things changed since we came on board (in 2011).”

The point of that change is to foster cohesion and an “inner belief” that drives the team forward in difficult moments. Klinsmann argues that it’s how a U.S. squad missing many of its big names became the first in nearly 80 years to win at the foreboding Estadio Azteca in Mexico City last August. It’s how the Americans recovered from a poor World Cup qualifying performance in Jamaica to win three straight and finish atop their group. It’s how a coach who has fielded a different starting lineup in each of his 21 games in charge guided the U.S. to a 9-2-3 record this year. The feeling and atmosphere and collective will within the group eventually transcends a given player.

“We want to push this thing a little forward and you’re working on so many different elements that the environment itself, the puzzle itself, will shape no matter what,” he said. “We never had the perfect roster, not even for one game. The team learns to adjust. … The players get more belief that they can actually get to another level, too, and the chemistry of a group … automatically will develop. They will kind of hook up with each other. And you saw tremendous progress from some players in the last 16 months.”

Chief among them are Michael Bradley and Jermaine Jones, one the formerly reticent son of a deposed coach and the other a German-born enforcer whose hard-nosed style has proved inspiring. Klinsmann said the pair has joined the likes of captain Carlos Bocanegra and ironman goalkeeper Tim Howard in forging that winning chemistry.

“He has the intelligence to understand when to step it up, how to react in certain moments, under stress and (has) an enormous hunger of the game,” Klinsmann said of Bradley. “The way he kind of inhales a new country, a different culture, a language. … He has a far better understanding of the role of a coach because he understands the way his dad fulfilled his role.”

Emboldened by his success in Italy, matured by fatherhood and increasingly comfortable with in his place in Klinsmann’s system, Bradley, 25, looks like a captain in the making. He has fought his way to prominence in the Dutch Eredivisie, the German Bundesliga and the Italian Serie A and has evolved into one of the national side’s leading spokesmen. Klinsmann is relying on him to inspire his U.S. teammates with his devotion and attention to detail.

Jones, meanwhile, had none of the advantages afforded to Bradley. Raised in a “very bad neighborhood” in Frankfurt, Jones “sends those signals out of always competing,” Klinsmann said.

The manager recalled his first January camp, which typically features players based in MLS or on the fringe of the U.S. player pool. Jones was available 11 months back while serving a suspension in Europe. Only 10 minutes after he took the field on the first day of practice, “it was a completely different dynamic,” Klinsmann said. “Other players were, ‘Shoot. What is this guy?’ Again, then everybody stepped it up. Everybody stepped it up from that moment, right away, said ‘Okay, we’ve got to kind of get as close as we can to that level.’”

Chemistry is especially critical with an American national team, Klinsmann argued, because so many younger players receive considerable hype from a fan base and press corps eager to celebrate those who might take the U.S. to the next level. Many become unquestioned starters for their MLS clubs or relative national team regulars far earlier than their counterparts in more established soccer countries.

“When the Break Sheas and (Juan) Agudelos and the (Teal) Bunburys of the world see every 10 seconds a commercial from them, that they are already the big star in the league, they believe that,” Klinsmann said. “Now you have Jermaine here at the table and he doesn’t even need to see the commercial because he senses the guy’s thinking he’s already a big shot. He puts them in line. Suddenly this is an educational process that you need (for the young player) to understand, ‘I’m nobody yet. I haven’t done anything yet.’”

While Klinsmann works to implement his tactics and push players to improve their on-field performances, he’s also searching for long-term harmony. Make no mistake, he hears and reads the questions and criticism of his roster selections. And he has no problem with the conversation. But he wants to make it clear that there’s rhyme and reason to every choice he makes.

“A World Cup roster is made out of players that are there 24/7 for the team. Chemistry is the biggest card to play and because of the chemistry, big nations do not make it into the final four. Big nations …,” he said.

“I had players in the (’06) Germany squad, I brought them in, there were better players I left behind. But I brought them in because I knew they were going to push the other ones every day in training. They were always positive. (Real Salt Lake midfielder) Kyle Beckerman is not in the starting lineup but I know what Kyle Beckerman gives you if he’s not in the starting lineup. He’s a giver. And you need givers. When you go two months in such a stressful kind of campaign, you can only carry along a few takers—very, very few takers. If you can. Because sooner or later the energy will be gone.”